Minority Babies Now the Majority

According to new census figures, most of the babies born in the country are members of racial minority groups. It's being called a "watershed moment" for the United States' ethnic makeup and brings us one step closer to 2042, when, social scientists predict, nonwhites will be outnumbered. Looks like we have about 12 years to come up with a more accurate term than "minorities" for people of color.

Population estimates show that 50.4 percent of children younger than 1 last year were Hispanic, black, Asian American or in other minority groups. That’s almost a full percentage point higher than the 49.5 percent of minority babies counted when the decennial census was taken in April 2010. Census Bureau demographers said the tipping point came three months later, in July.

The latest estimates, which gauge changes since the last census, are a reflection of an immigration wave that began four decades ago. The transformation of the country’s racial and ethnic makeup has gathered steam as the white population grows collectively older, especially compared with Hispanics.